Gigabyte Radeon HD2400 XT Review

Introduction:

When someone mentions a video card, the first thing that we think is how fast will it play that new game? Never does anyone say 'Wow, that card would push my HTPCs video capabilities to the max'. On the other hand, say you are building a computer for use in an office environment, or for your school work. Do you really need to spend hundreds of dollars if you are not going to use it for gaming or graphic design? Of course not, but then what would be the best, to suit your needs? You don't want the bottom of the barrel either, especially if you are running Windows Vista's Aero Interface. So where does that leave you?

Enter Gigabyte's Radeon HD 2400 XT video card. The HD 2400 XT is a mid-range graphics accelerator card, that gives you the options you need without draining your wallet to get them. The HD 2400 XT supports DirectX 10, OpenGL 2.0, as well as Shader Model 4.0. This will allow you to run the goodies of Windows Vista and while you probably will not be gaming on extreme settings, it should allow you some casual gaming at discrete resolutions and graphics settings. The HD 2400 XT also supports HDCP and ATI's AVIVO for high definition playback of videos, without taxing the CPU to run them. So now let's take a look at what makes it handle all of this technology.

Closer Look:

The Gigabyte HD 2400 XT comes in nice packaging, with a lot of the features right on the front of the box. This is an excellent marketing strategy, because when I look to buy a piece of hardware, I do not want to search all over the box to see what the features it offers. The back of the box lists some more of the features in several different languages, as well as highlighting some of the more unique features of the card, which we will go over later in this review.

When you open the packaging, you can see the care taken to secure the HD 2400 XT while being transported. The card is wrapped in an anti-static bag and sandwiched in a cardboard cutout, to keep from moving around to much. Under the card are the accessories that are included with the Gigabyte HD 2400 XT. Included is the card itself, a quick install guide in several languages, a manual, the driver/software CD, a DVI to VGA adapter and an S-Video to Composite Video Adapter.